Last week, I blogged about a Florida case in which two teens were arrested for aggravated online stalking. Yesterday, I noted a case in New Jersey where a young man has been sent to jail for cyberbullying. Now today, Kate Durio of KATC reports that Lafayette, Louisiana police have arrested two teens for cyberstalking/cyberbullying. These cases come after news of even more horrific cases such as that involving Tyler Clementi’s suicide following a privacy violation.

Children’s reputations and lives are being seriously impacted on a daily basis because children and teens neither “get” how serious a privacy violation is nor appreciate its impact on their future – which may include impact on ability to get a job, or on whether they will even be free to have a job or will be spending time in jail. The impulsivity of youth and lack of ability to keep the future in mind is exacerbated by the availability of “anonymous” or convenient ways to gossip or smear others and the lack of face-to-face contact at the moment the “send” button is clicked.

Clearly we need to do more to educate youth. And although it will not be launched in time for Data Privacy Day on January 28, there’s a new initiative that I learned about through the Data Privacy Day 2011 web site that I wanted to share here:

EWF’s Cyber Security School Challenge

Join the members of Executive Women’s Forum (EWF) as they launch their “Cyber Security School Challenge,” an educational outreach program designed to bring privacy and information security professionals, risk and GRC executives in touch with schools and students for the purpose of educating students about online security, privacy, safety, and ethics. Lesson plans, games, and instructions from leading academic and industry authorities have been developed to enable volunteers to teach our children best practices of “cyber awareness,” encouraging safe, secure, and responsible use of computers. MySecureCyberspace, Safe and Secure Online, and the Cyber Security Awareness Volunteer Program C-Save, are all contributors to this Cyber Security Challenge. You can attend the Launch meeting, which will be held in conjunction with the EWF Meet and Greet at the RSA conference (men and women welcome!), on Tuesday, February 15, 2011, from 5:30pm-7:30pm, at the Moscone Center in North Room 132, San Francisco, CA, to learn more about how to participate. To attend, RSVP with your name, company and title to: [email protected]. If you would like to learn more about participating, but cannot attend the meeting, please click here.

What a great initiative, and I look forward to learning more about it. Do check out the web sites to see what materials they already have available that you can use with your children or in your child’s school.

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